Long post....
OKay, I want to preface this by saying, DS's anger is what I would consider typical 2 yo anger. He gets mad if we don't let him do or have something he wants. He's not out of control or anything.
Anyway, recently, he has started calling us "Stupidmommy" or "stupiddaddy" when he gets angry (usually if he wants to do something that we won't let him do). This is an escalation from where he was. A few months ago, he started roaring at me when he was mad. Literally... "ROOOOAAAAARRRRR!" I have always said something like, "you're so mad! you feel like you need to roar!" To which his reply is always an even angier "I"M NOT MAD!!!!!!! ROAAAAARRRR!!!" Then, a week or so after this happened, he tried to hit me once or twice. I got very firm with him and said, "Do not hit me. If you're mad, you can roar, but you can not hit me." Both times, he got very upset and cuddly with me (I didn't yell this at him, but I was firm and I think he just really got the point that hitting mommy is NOT okay). So anyway, the hitting doesn't really happen. Sometimes I see his start to raise his hand at me, but then he stops and roars or yells instead. Well anyway, this roaring has escalated to calling us stupid. And I'm not really sure what to do with that. Whenever we try to use the empathetic "you must be really angry." type response... that just seems to make him madder... well, it doesn't seem to help at any rate. So I've also tried just saying something like, "that is rude. I'm going to go in the other room. You can come join me when you feel like being nice." Or I've put him in another room saying the same thing. I'm sure there's a better way to handle this... but I just haven't figured it out.
Well yesterday, he started pretending to shoot us when he got mad. I really had no idea what to do or say... every idea that popped into my head seemed like a bad idea that would only escalate things, so I ended up just going about my business and just ignoring it. He did it with DH again tonight. DH and I have agreed that, while we will not allow toy guns in the house, we also will not stifle "homemade" gun play... the main thing is that he cannot shoot people or animals. And DS knows this. Whenever he's started "shooting" things with his finger he'll say, "don't shoot mommy. Don't shoot Georgie (our dog)" or something similar. So when he gets mad and "shoots" us... he knows he's pushing the bounds. This afternoon, it was when DH was laying down with him trying to encourage him to take a nap (sleep issues are HARD with DS)... DS kept screaming "GO AWAY! GO AWAY!" and then started "shooting" DH. The things is, if we just put him down by himself, he won't go to sleep and then he gets overtired and cranky. So we feel like this particular situation is a delimma. If DH goes away... then he has given in to the rude demand. So our typical "separation until DS can be nice" tactic doesn't really apply. But we also don't feel good about just letting DS treat us like that.
So there has to be someone with some better ideas than what we've been trying. I realize that it's a process and that it's not going to get better overnight. I just want to feel like we have strategies that are actually going to point us in the right direction, ykim?
ETA: I do want to add that once DS has calmed down, I've always gone in and talked to him about calling us stupid and said that we love him very much, but that we want him to say nice things to us... then I give him a choice of offering a hug or an I Love You or an I'm Sorry... just to give him an opportunity to learn how to make up for saying something mean.
OKay, I want to preface this by saying, DS's anger is what I would consider typical 2 yo anger. He gets mad if we don't let him do or have something he wants. He's not out of control or anything.
Anyway, recently, he has started calling us "Stupidmommy" or "stupiddaddy" when he gets angry (usually if he wants to do something that we won't let him do). This is an escalation from where he was. A few months ago, he started roaring at me when he was mad. Literally... "ROOOOAAAAARRRRR!" I have always said something like, "you're so mad! you feel like you need to roar!" To which his reply is always an even angier "I"M NOT MAD!!!!!!! ROAAAAARRRR!!!" Then, a week or so after this happened, he tried to hit me once or twice. I got very firm with him and said, "Do not hit me. If you're mad, you can roar, but you can not hit me." Both times, he got very upset and cuddly with me (I didn't yell this at him, but I was firm and I think he just really got the point that hitting mommy is NOT okay). So anyway, the hitting doesn't really happen. Sometimes I see his start to raise his hand at me, but then he stops and roars or yells instead. Well anyway, this roaring has escalated to calling us stupid. And I'm not really sure what to do with that. Whenever we try to use the empathetic "you must be really angry." type response... that just seems to make him madder... well, it doesn't seem to help at any rate. So I've also tried just saying something like, "that is rude. I'm going to go in the other room. You can come join me when you feel like being nice." Or I've put him in another room saying the same thing. I'm sure there's a better way to handle this... but I just haven't figured it out.
Well yesterday, he started pretending to shoot us when he got mad. I really had no idea what to do or say... every idea that popped into my head seemed like a bad idea that would only escalate things, so I ended up just going about my business and just ignoring it. He did it with DH again tonight. DH and I have agreed that, while we will not allow toy guns in the house, we also will not stifle "homemade" gun play... the main thing is that he cannot shoot people or animals. And DS knows this. Whenever he's started "shooting" things with his finger he'll say, "don't shoot mommy. Don't shoot Georgie (our dog)" or something similar. So when he gets mad and "shoots" us... he knows he's pushing the bounds. This afternoon, it was when DH was laying down with him trying to encourage him to take a nap (sleep issues are HARD with DS)... DS kept screaming "GO AWAY! GO AWAY!" and then started "shooting" DH. The things is, if we just put him down by himself, he won't go to sleep and then he gets overtired and cranky. So we feel like this particular situation is a delimma. If DH goes away... then he has given in to the rude demand. So our typical "separation until DS can be nice" tactic doesn't really apply. But we also don't feel good about just letting DS treat us like that.
So there has to be someone with some better ideas than what we've been trying. I realize that it's a process and that it's not going to get better overnight. I just want to feel like we have strategies that are actually going to point us in the right direction, ykim?
ETA: I do want to add that once DS has calmed down, I've always gone in and talked to him about calling us stupid and said that we love him very much, but that we want him to say nice things to us... then I give him a choice of offering a hug or an I Love You or an I'm Sorry... just to give him an opportunity to learn how to make up for saying something mean.
